It is commonly known to use clothing such as gloves to aid humans in gripping objects, such as sports gloves worn by athletes for more secure grips on catching and throwing footballs, holding bats, holding golf clubs. Also certain rubber grips are helpful in improving grip and friction in wet conditions. These grip garment gloves are used by a wide variety of professions and disciplines to provide grip to the hand grasp of objects and to also sometimes protect from cold elements and even furthermore can protect from injury if the garment or cloth is thick enough or padded.
In some cases, reinforced cycling clothing may have patches of material with a different coefficient of friction than the remainder of the garment, for example on the seating portion.
In Yoga, a practitioner assumes various poses, which often result in contact between a limb and another body part. Holding a pose may require balance and strength. Further, the poses may require strength, and result in perspiration. Likewise, clothing worn during yoga may be slick and non-abrasive. Therefore, a problem arises that the frictional coefficient between the limb and another body region that is sought for contact is insufficient to maintain a pose without exerting forces, and indeed, the positions may be such that no normal muscle group is available to exert such forces. Therefore, the pose may fail or be unduly difficult, for reasons distinct from the “purpose” of the pose.
Cloth used for Yoga exercise typically has a lower coefficient of friction than that of typical skin, and thus sliding is likely. Traction enhanced gloves, socks or footwear are known for use in Yoga exercises. These gloves and socks have even been incorporated in the Yoga community in the style of a grip glove or socks with rubber bumps on its palms or sole molded into the cloth. These Yoga marketed grip gloves and socks help with grip on the hands and feet, but don't generally cover the normal Yoga contact points, for example, on the legs and outside (posterior) of the arms.
A Yoga participant will generally want to get the best work out and achieve and maintain as good of form as possible while performing “Yoga moves” throughout the workout. Certain moves are more difficult than others and encounter situations where the performers of the moves finds themselves slipping off the fabric/garment of the clothing they are wearing, or off their own sweaty skin produced during excursion. Some of these moves are for stretching and balance and the effectiveness of the exercise is compromised or not achieved due to this slipping, and therefore the practitioner suffers excess slipping seeking to maintain the “Yoga move” and eliminating portions of the benefit of the move he or she is trying to perform.
See, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,302,368; 2,831,196; 2,948,899; 2,986,740; 3,338,776; 3,526,229; 3,823,712; 4,273,216; 4,698,847; 4,730,625; 4,731,882; 4,862,523; 4,910,802; 4,911,439; 4,945,571; 4,946,453; 4,953,856; 4,993,705; 5,007,412; 5,014,358; 5,046,194; 5,088,728; 5,149,099; 5,179,942; 5,201,074; 5,282,277; 5,306,222; 5,337,418; 5,351,340; 5,367,708; 5,402,742; 5,410,755; 5,445,601; 5,451,060; 5,518,481; 5,536,246; 5,537,690; 5,542,123; 5,570,472; 5,582,583; 5,591,122; 5,611,084; 5,638,548; 5,699,559; 5,792,034; 5,799,328; 5,823,851; 5,829,058; 5,842,959; 5,857,947; 5,867,827; 5,896,578; 5,937,442; 5,960,474; 5,978,965; 5,978,966; 5,996,120; 6,006,363; 6,061,832; 6,068,606; 6,080,038; 6,086,551; 6,146,240; 6,176,816; 6,195,801; 6,231,488; 6,240,564; 6,260,201; 6,279,164; 6,287,242; 6,314,580; 6,364,851; 6,375,581; 6,430,753; 6,454,628; 6,546,560; 6,620,026; 6,684,410; 6,698,026; 6,719,712; 6,805,681; 6,892,396; 7,074,204; 7,087,032; 7,089,597; 7,117,538; 7,191,470; 7,241,252; 7,246,381; 7,374,523; 7,395,557; 7,559,093; 7,568,966; 7,631,367; 7,730,553; 7,908,670; 7,934,267; 7,996,924; 8,123,663; 8,156,572; 8,225,423; D539512; 20020078485; 20030028952; 20030233062; 20040000002; 20040016041; 20040107479; 20040111782; 20040133959; 20040255358; 20050038367; 20050086721; 20050193461; 20050197607; 20060026732; 20060026733; 20060026740; 20060070164; 20060070165; 20060101553; 20060129076; 20060169004; 20070050879; 20070271668; 20070271671; 20070294801; 20080022431; 20080066211; 20080076645; 20080120757; 20080134409; 20080141430; 20080141431; 20080178365; 20080189824; 20080295216; 20080319365; 20090025115; 20090062704; 20090133181; 20090171259; 20090172858; 20090265828; 20100050313; 20100077527; each of which is expressly incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.